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Play “Return of Joy”
Free same-meter accompaniment for Return of Joy (William Cowper): organ, piano or guitar playing the tune OLD 100TH (Louis Bourgeois) in four-part harmony, 6 verses, with the words on screen. Choose the key and speed, add an introduction, project the words on a TV, or practice your own choir part. Made for churches and home groups without a musician.
Sung here to OLD 100TH (Louis Bourgeois), a Long Meter (8.8.8.8) tune — not necessarily the tune usually paired with this text. Any tune in the same meter fits the words.
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- 1When darkness long has veiled my mind,
- And smiling day once more appears,
- Then, my Redeemer, then I find
- The folly of my doubts and fears.
- 2I chide my unbelieving heart,
- And blush that I should ever be
- Thus prone to act so base a part,
- Or harbour one hard thought of thee.
- 3O let me then at length be taught
- (What I am still so slow to learn)
- That God is love, and changes not,
- Nor knows the shadow of a turn.
- 4Sweet truth, and easy to repeat!
- But when my faith is sharply tried,
- I find myself a learner yet,
- Unskilful, weak, and apt to slide.
- 5But, O my Lord, one look from thee
- Subdues the disobedient will;
- Drives doubt and discontent away,
- And thy rebellious worm is still.
- 6Thou art as ready to forgive
- As I am ready to repine;
- Thou, therefore, all the praise receive;
- Be shame and self-abhorrence mine.
About this music
OLD 100TH — Louis Bourgeois. Setting: Sternhold and Hopkins' Psalter, 1561.. The score is from the Open Hymnal Project, copied from ccel from Sternhold and Hopkins' Psalter 1561. Words: "Hymnal and Canticles of the Protestant Episcopal Church", 1875, hymn 405.; music and setting are in the public domain. The words above are from the hymnal cited on the Return of Joy page.
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